Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Ireland/Assessment/Archive 2

BannerShell
This evening I noticed that MadmanBot moves project templates into a BannerShell. It seems to work when there are 4 project templates on a talk page like it did here. You will notice that it add the "nested=yes" parameter to the template, even if it does not have one. Seems to take about 7.5 hours to complete its process which is done alphabetically. Interesting. ww2censor 05:02, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

1981 Irish hunger strike
I assesses 1981 Irish hunger strike as FA and high because I saw that it had been promoted just a few minutes ago as I expected it would be. In the overall scope of this project I think high is quite adequate though some may feel it is too high. Your thoughts please. Cheers. ww2censor 23:01, 30 August 2007 (UTC)


 * I think High is justifiable, though we can reconsider if too many historical episodes end up there. Perhaps in the long term perspective, Mid, but in the current period, High.  Thanks re. Department pointer, and hoping to see new assessment chart from bot soon. SeoR 16:12, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

What I've done and other comments
I will be going away next week, to London and Ireland, for about 10 days so my edits will be few if any, but I have been through all the Category:Mountains and hills of the Republic of Ireland maybe a bit tough on rating some. Are we also to do the mountains of NI?. I've also been through my watchlist of just under 400 and started to reduce the unassessed articles. One thing that Flowerpotman may need to do is tell us where the positive parameter entries for infobox-needed and attention-needed show up. I've been waiting for the new stats to show up but still nothing 6 days since the last bot results—should we ask someone. ww2censor 21:20, 31 August 2007 (UTC)
 * "...where the positive parameter entries for infobox-needed and attention-needed show up?. Oh, that might help, all right. They are in Category:Ireland articles needing infoboxes and Category:Ireland articles needing attention, which are sub-categories of Category:WikiProject Ireland, rather than sub-categories of Category:WikiProject Ireland articles. FlowerpotmaN &middot;(t) 22:37, 31 August 2007 (UTC)


 * Just looking at the bot logs on this and other projects and it does seem to skip a three day period now and then. Not sure why... FlowerpotmaN &middot;(t) 22:47, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Top criteria articles
Right now there are 28 articles rated top but some of them seen rated too high. I think the following should be rated "High" rather than "Top":
 * Talk:Brú na Bóinne
 * Talk:Electricity Supply Board
 * Talk:Gaelic Athletic Association
 * Talk:Ireland national rugby union team
 * Talk:Irish diaspora
 * Talk:Law of the Republic of Ireland
 * Talk:Shannon Airport
 * Talk:War of the Grand Alliance

There are several others that should perhaps be "Top" especially most of those listed by Flowerpotman here. ww2censor 04:18, 2 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Certainly agree with all bar the ESB and GAA. (Though it was myself made Brú na Bóinne top). Those organisations' place in Irish history and society would justify top, IMO. (Sarah777 09:04, 2 September 2007 (UTC))


 * (Back again :O)) I made that list based on something I saw on the Canada WP where they have adompted a core set of articles to be rated high. Now, we shouldn't be limited by this, but a core set of articles that provide an introduction to Ireland, and this list is essentially the articles that branch off from the Ireland article, seems like something to work from.  FlowerpotmaN &middot;(t) 09:12, 2 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Difficult to argue with your list Flowerpot, maybe move it here so we can get some input? (Sarah777 10:03, 2 September 2007 (UTC))


 * My tuppence worth - GAA is Top (with the dominant sports and over 1/4 of the population involved in some way), Rugby Team, Shannon and War definitely not, but High looks OK.
 * For the others - Law is critical but in terms of how an encyclopedia is used, I think High is fine. Using the same filter, I would tend to leave Bru na Boinne as Top.
 * ESB is tough but on balance, and pending an article split as it breaks up, would tend to leave in Top. The Diaspora is also tough, as it is bigger than the actual population, etc., but on the other hand, considering the material...
 * I think we should start conservative, try to parcel out the 100 or so slots for Top (so many for Country Basics, Major Places, Key Organisations, Essential Cultural elements, Main Historical Periods / Events, Key Figures, including Politicians, - will be interested to see Canada list), and if we have space, we can come back and promote something. SeoR 11:45, 2 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Have now looked at that list, and would say Absolutely Yes, all essentials. SeoR 11:47, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Ok, just moving the list here.  FlowerpotmaN &middot;(t) 21:55, 2 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Given lack of counter-points, hope it is OK if I ensure all the above are marked Top. We will then have a good basis for deciding if the contents of Top are now about right, identifying further important additions and moving others to High. SeoR 07:39, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Progress, and Top / High
3202!! That is something, looking back just a couple of months. I see Top has now grown to 40, so perhaps now would be a good time to review Top and High. From my perspective, I'd be comfortable with perhaps 33-36 of the Top, but would take out a few. And similarly in High - comfortable with perhaps 80% but would question a few people and places being there. My preference would be to start with a lower priority if something is debatable, and promote if High or Top look like they, and the pool of support, can handle more. Have been a bit occupied with business last couple of weeks but stepping up pace of assessment again since yesterday. SeoR 07:30, 28 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Top enhanced by addition of most of the remainder from Flowerpotman's list (Demographics, for example, is a DAB to RoI / NI articles, not sure if we should take both to Top, or High). 3 of the suggested-for-consideration 8 I have moved to High.  That leaves debate on (Brú na Bóinne, the ESB, GAA, Irish Diaspora, Law of the Republic of Ireland) open - and I vote to leave the first 4 High, but would be less sure re. Law of the RoI.
 * In terms of the 45 now in Top, I would wonder a bit about Barry McGuigan - very visible but from contribution, would have thought High fair, and would be pretty unsure re. the 1918 election and the M50 motorway too. On the other hand, I would give serious consideration to adding Charles Stewart Parnell and even more so Daniel O'Connell. Both, especially the former, had enormous effect. And I think there are one or two NI figures we might need to consider...
 * Also, I suspect we should have something on Politics and on Government (with care re. history), on Education (probably has to be two articles) and on Economy (also min. two articles - but the current situation is even messier), no? And Religion in Ireland...  And then in either Top or High, Media.  Some have been at this a lot longer, so next views? SeoR 09:32, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Progress has been extensive but maybe I may be guilty of being a little under or overzealous with some of my ratings. However, remember that in any given field of interest a person or topic should be rated according to the standing within that topic and not just the overall standing within the project; hence my rating of Barry McGuigan in terms of the field of sport. M50 motorway was originally a Sarah mid rating but I raised it due to the importance of this road in the overall infrastructure of the capital city. Perhaps high would be more appropriate, but if so could, or would, any roads possibly be classed as top? Again Charles Stewart Parnell and Daniel O'Connell are mine and if the consensus is top I am happy with that.
 * May I suggest we revisit the top and high rated articles a little later to see if we have a consensus on them all. We could do that by each of us bringing a small selection here at a time and reviewing them together otherwise there seems to be little disagreement on the ratings made already. Let's just get through the basics first. BTW, if you want to see the progress of the assessments over the last 2 months, I have created a page with all the statistics in one place. ww2censor 14:40, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
 * I had resolved to find one category per night and rate it but I must say I was flagging....putting stub/low on page after page is a wee bit tedious! But I'll swing back into action now you guys are back. Good page Ww; I tagged it! Re the "top" articles; I agree with demoting M50 and Barry (though I'd not be too adamant about it), but I think the 1918 election was a the biggest watershed in Irish history of the last century. Can't see it as less than "top". (Sarah777 23:27, 28 September 2007 (UTC))

Finding more unassessed articles
For a star here are some places to find more unassessed articles:
 * Irish Republicanism articles – maybe 400+ – generally we can most likely rely on the Irish Republicanism Project's ratings
 * Years in Ireland – many have links to unassessed articles
 * Category:History of Ireland plus its sub-categories – could be 400+
 * Category:Irish people stubs plus all its sub-categories – could be 1,500 - Category:Irish politician stubs contains 643 but what proportion is unassessed is unknown
 * Castles in Ireland
 * Category:Irish navigational boxes is another good place to find more articles

Sarah should be pleased because this might make about 6,000 with the figures above but overall maybe 8,000–10,000 (wow) does not seem so far-fetched after all, or does it? ww2censor 14:41, 28 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Indeed, I noted the Years, and stayed away for now. Also, with some crossover with the above, the Peerage of Ireland (extant titles) and the other related cats (with all titles that ever existed) add many more. And I have not yet finished with writers and artists by any means.
 * On specific edits, I deliberately did not check who, but I agree with the stance of reviewing after further time, and the approach you mention, and for now, I guess everyone has developed a system. And yes, each of us has probably areas where we are tougher or less so - I err on the conservative side, the more so in categories I have deeper knowledge in. Onwards... SeoR 14:56, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
 * My estimate of 5,000 articles was made by assuming a per capita equivalent to the Australia project. What I forget to take into account was that the Aussie project will not have captured all the Australian articles. So the higher estimates could well be correct. (Sarah777 23:32, 28 September 2007 (UTC))


 * If anyone wants to tackle Category:Irish music, there is a lot in there. I am tempted to join WikiProject Irish Music so I can add their template message in as well :O)  FlowerpotmaN &middot;(t) 23:55, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Sound like there are several hundred article there alone with all the sub-cats. Go for it Flowerpotman. ww2censor 01:48, 29 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Sarah did you not assess any of the Northern Ireland castles. Isn't NI included in our are of interest? I think it is, even though there is a NI specific project too. ww2censor 03:53, 29 September 2007 (UTC)
 * I thought there was a separate NI project - didn't want to be accused of aggressive nationalism - that can get you into all sorts of trouble here!(Sarah777 09:46, 29 September 2007 (UTC))

Northern Ireland articles
The Northern Ireland WikiProject is a dependant project to this one, so their assessments are relative to their own project. Because we are the parent project covering all of the island of Ireland, not just the Republic of Ireland, all articles concerning Northern Ireland should be assessed by this project too even though they may have already been assessed by the NI project. Their statistics are here and might be useful as guidance to more articles for assessment though some may have been done already by us. We may well assess the NI project articles similarly though I have noticed that many don't have importance ratings even though they are classified. ww2censor 14:48, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

A dubious inclusion
I noticed this edit of Ice pop where a project assessment tag was added by another editor but wonder if, just because Ireland is mentioned in the text, this comes within the realm of our project. I don't think so. What do others think. TIA ww2censor 14:56, 1 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Hmmm. Tough call! Kill it. But I was thinking of including Halloween (my very first editing was done there)...what do you think? (Sarah777 16:38, 1 October 2007 (UTC))
 * Halloween does have some Irish substance to it, so yes, but Ice pop is a no. ww2censor 17:21, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Ice pop is (errr) popping up in a few WikiProjects, it seems.  FlowerpotmaN &middot;(t) 00:24, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
 * FlagSteward just added a wikiproject template for every country mentioned in the article, but that does not mean they all belongs. ww2censor 00:28, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Hey Kids, Rock and roll.
OK, I think in a fit of exuberance (and one copy and paste incident), I did rate one or two bands a bit high. But that said, can we establish some criteria here? I think a high rating for bands with international success - critical and sales - is reasonable; so I would stick with Snow Patrol and suggest a few additions: Boomtown Rats and Thin Lizzy for example.  FlowerpotmaN &middot;(t) 04:09, 7 October 2007 (UTC)


 * This brings up the difficulty of comparing across subject matter categories. In R'n'R terms Snow Patrol may be important - but in terms of Ireland are they as important as great events in history, major political parties or the M50? Just can't see it. Commercial success - surely that puts Daniel O'Donnell near a "top"? And Boyzone would be so far ahead of pack we'd be placing them behind U2 but ahead of Van Morrison. If is is just critical acclaim then Planxty would soar higher than the R'n'R bands. And in the field of classical music I'm sure there is some world-class Irish musician out there that most of us have never heard of. We probably need a guide-chart like the others to cover either "music" specifically or "entertainment" in general. (Sarah777 09:52, 7 October 2007 (UTC))


 * I know this is an area that might tend towards subjectivity, but another way to look at it is: what Ireland-related articles are people outside the island likely to be interested in and reading? And from that view, I have to say that culture and entertainment (for lack of a better word) articles probably do have a bigger draw than many other areas of interest. So (and let's not keep picking on Snow Patrol :O)) but still, I would be surprised if there weren't a lot more people reading their article than (say, for example) the M50 article . There does seem to be a bit of a gap in the entertainment and cultural areas in the high rated articles. FlowerpotmaN &middot;(t) 20:56, 7 October 2007 (UTC)


 * If importance is decided only by global recognition then Britney Spears is as important as George Bush or Putin. In fact though the article on Spears is GA class it isn't even rated for importance! For example, the M50 is more important to the Irish economy than maybe all those bands combined - and are you really sure that Snow Patrol is more famous to foreigners than the M50? I'd have me doubts. (Sarah777 21:21, 7 October 2007 (UTC))
 * Actually I we are the only WikiProject on a geographical level I can find that does have a road in the high top category, or high, or mid.  FlowerpotmaN &middot;(t) 23:18, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Perhaps, Flowerpotman, you are missing the main point about high ratings in so far as the subject: "Must have had a large impact in their main discipline, across a couple of generations and had some impact outside their country of origin." If you apply that objectively to culture and entertainment hopefully you will realise and re-evaluate your recent ratings. ww2censor 21:24, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
 * I know, and I am about to reduce the importance level of anything I rated as high while we discuss, but just using the guideline as the only criterion, or for that matter, comparing like with like, we would have to remove more articles from the high class: The Cranberries certainly (across a couple of generations?), the Waterboys probably. I'll come back with a proposal tonight or tomorrow to discuss, if no-one beats me to it.  FlowerpotmaN &middot;(t) 23:12, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
 * So, Flowerpotman, put up your ideas here when you are ready. Earlier I suggested we might need to review the rating of High and Top articles as well as FAs and GAs when the major assessment has calmed down. So let's just keep going without being too too bold for now. Cheers ww2censor 00:16, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
 * So, if you see a dozen Irish bands of the 80's suddenly in top rating? No worries.:O) FlowerpotmaN &middot;(t) 00:23, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
 * (Sligt update) Actually, when I said tonight or tomorrow, that of cousre meanns the weekend. (Sorry, had a mild lurgy during the week, so my Wiki-ing is a bit muted and sporadic. Anything that involves concentrated thought seems beyond me. [Yes, I'm a wuss when I get these things.) Back to normal, I hope, by the weekend.) FlowerpotmaN &middot;(t) 23:38, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Halloween rated A-class
With both citation and cleanup tags there is no way that Halloween can possibly be classed an A, possibly a B. It was demoted from a GA on October 5, 2006 and has not been resubmitted since. Comments were made that there had been a cleanup tag that was removed but that tag appears again and any GA or A class article should not have any tags. Sarah this is really a comment for you as you placed the assessment tag on the page. I don't think there is a need to necessarily follow another project's assessment (which you may or may not have done) that may have been put there some time ago when the article was in a different form than now. ww2censor 06:06, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Because no one has neither objected nor supported this assessment, I am demoting to a B-class. ww2censor 16:06, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

Have we stopped working?
New stats arrived today. Are we slacking with only 8 assessments in 3 days? I am to blame too, but I will make sure it is 4,000 plus by tonight. Let's get some more done to get to 5,000. I have found many articles are tucked in around Irish mythology and ancient history, king, etc. Others should be able to find some hidden treasurers amongst odd categories too. Thanks and keep up the good work. Cheers ww2censor 16:06, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

One more category down
Everything in Category:Monasteries in the Republic of Ireland now has an assessment, save for a couple of articles I didn't rate because I'm a primary editor on them. Dppowell 23:33, 23 October 2007 (UTC)


 * I spotted your edit removing Multyfarnham from the monastery list. Wonder was it a comment on the social scene??! (Sarah777 20:40, 24 October 2007 (UTC))
 * Nope, just setting a precedent for disambiguation between the abbeys and the towns in which they reside. ;) Dppowell 22:51, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
 * And now Multyfarnham Friary has an article of its own. Dppowell 23:31, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
 * You are a brave editor! When the dreaded deletionists and mergeristas spot that you'll have a battle on your hands. (Sarah777 20:39, 25 October 2007 (UTC))
 * Do you really think so? It would be awfully cynical to suggest that neither the town nor abbey are notable on their own...and that would be my main argument against any merge proposal. Dppowell 21:06, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

As a stickler for notability, I can't resist weighing in here. Notability is demonstrated per WP:NOTE by the existence of non-trivial coverage in multiple independent secondary sources, and the article on Multyfarnham Friary so far lists only one. I'm sure that there must be many more available, so I have tagged the article with refimprove rather than mergeing it back again ... but unless the references are provided, it will eventually be either merged or deleted. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 09:12, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

University assessment question
I have noticed that the importance ratings for Irish universities is not consistent. For example, TCD, UCC and NUI Maynooth are rated high while UL and UCD are rated mid. Would it not make more sense for all of the Irish universities to have the same importance rating. Apologies if this is not the correct way to raise this point. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.70.160.127 (talk • contribs) (22:15, November 5, 2007)
 * Nah, as any fule kno, Limerick should be low importance ;)
 * Seriously, tho, I can't see much grounds for distinguishing in importance between UCD and TCD; UCD is bigger, but TCD has a much longer history. UCC and UCG, because of smaller size, possibly slightly lower, but maybe enough to make much difference. Limerick and DCU, with their shorter histories, possibly lower.
 * So I'd suggest high for TCD and UCD, mid for Limerick and DCU, and either mid or high for the others. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 22:06, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

James II of England
How are we going to rate James II of England now that a project tag has been added and it is an FA? high might be appropriate but I want to know how anyone else feels about the article (not the man himself). ww2censor 17:28, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I'd be happy with "low" and categorise him under "Tyrants" - or maybe "Failed Tyrants" (Sarah777 19:03, 14 November 2007 (UTC))
 * Doesn't Category:House of Stuart cover that? ;) --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 09:07, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Somehow I expected you might comment about the man and not the article!! ww2censor 19:08, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
 * OK - I'll butt out of this one - or "recuse" myself as Wikipedian Admins are given to saying! (Sarah777 19:18, 14 November 2007 (UTC))
 * What, you can't be objective? Of course you can. His involvement in the Battle of the Boyne must be sufficient for him to rate as being an important figure in Irish history, whether you like him or not. ww2censor 19:24, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I have done the deed at Talk:James II of England. (Sarah777 19:31, 14 November 2007 (UTC))
 * Seconded. SeoR 23:03, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

Green light for BHGbot
BHGbot has been approved! It has been a longer process than I had expected, but I'm sure that the scrutiny was well-justified, since a feral bot could wreak havoc. Anyway, this should help speed up the assessment work.

I have promised that every job BHGbot does will be advertised in advance, and will proceed only if there is consensus. The first few jobs will be advertised here within the next few days. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 17:03, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I just saw the approval. well done indeed. We may not like seeing so many unassessed article but it gives us some grasp of the actual extent of Irish articles. I recommend that you take up Reedy Boy's suggestion to use his Reedy Bot. Cheers and thanks again. ww2censor (talk) 19:06, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Well done also, I look forward to the help (though I had just gotten Unassessed down to one page... up it goes soon!). SeoR (talk) 23:25, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

Category class not listed in totals?
Back after some business travel, taking out some more Unassessed. One thing - while the quality ratings, Unassessed and List are totalled, items placed in Class: Category stay in "Unassessed." Who knows what the reason for this is? SeoR (talk) 23:26, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

BHGbot tagging begins
has finally begun its tagging work &mdash; sorry for the delay.

Last night, the bot tagged with WikiProject Ireland category all categories which are subcats of Category:Geography of Ireland (see User:BHGbot/Job0001), and the next task is to tag all the remaining categories; see User:BHGbot/Job0003.

I have made the list of categories to be tagged, at User:BHGbot/job0003/list, which involved finding all the subcats of Category:Ireland, and then manually removing all the stray categories which had been included as a result of categories such as Category:Celtic Christianity, which is a subcat of but includes lots of Welsh, Cornish and Scottish chistian categories. A similar purge had to be done of the subcats of Category:Irish diaspora, to avoid including every category of people of Irish descent and even subcats of those such as Category:Warren Commission.

Before I run the bot, would anyone like to check the list? Please don't add anything to it, but feel free to remove anything which you think shouldn't be there. Whether or not you want to check the list, I'd be grateful for any comments at User talk:BHGbot/job0003, even if it's just a brief "fine, go ahead". There are 4,127 categories on the list, and it's much easier to restrain a bot before it starts work than to undo things afterwards, so I'd like some approval before this big job rolls. Thanks! --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 16:04, 28 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Replied at BotPage - fine -- Sarah777 (talk) 16:13, 28 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Did a random check on User:BHGbot/Job0001; Category:Landforms of Ireland - not all the articles are tagged. (Sarah777 (talk) 16:29, 28 December 2007 (UTC))
 * No, the first jobs are only tagging categories. Articles will be next, and there are lots of them to do!. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 16:50, 28 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Hi BHG - couldn't find any subcats that were tagged - not sure that it worked (but it may just be me!). Maybe just as well, because if you tag Geography of Ireland subcats (and any other Ireland subcats), it will tag a load of Northern Ireland subcats (as in your list), which doubtless NI Wiki people will object to as they should be part of NI Wiki Project. This will happen because Ireland in Wikipedia covers the whole island and therefore both Northern Ireland and Republic of Ireland subcats. A lot of Wiki subcats have Ireland titles, yet should relate to Republic of Ireland only (as there are Northern Ireland counterparts) - I have tried to fix some, but not all yet. Just something to consider - maybe the bot should only be working on Republic of Ireland subcats, or maybe first we should correct the overall structural problem (somehow!!). Hope this is coherent. Ardfern (talk) 17:02, 28 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Hi Ardfern, I'm not sure where you were looking, but if you see Category:Category-Class Ireland articles, there is a lot there already!
 * As to the Northern Ireland articles, yes, they should be part of the NI wiki project, but there's no reason why they can't also be part of the WikiProject Ireland, and so far as I can see lots of good resaons to include them in both. My intention was that once the categories were all tagged for WikiProject Ireland, I would ask the WPNI folks if they woukd like me to tag all the NI categories with WPNI. Doing it this way round will ensure that NI ends up on the top, which seems appropriate for NI categories. Does that sound OK? --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs)


 * Hi BHG - knew I was looking in the wrong place. re NI - sounds ok to me, but I tend to not be hung up about such things. However, lots on NI Wiki are very, very politically sensitive and just don't see themselves as part of Ireland, so it may cause a bit of an unnecessary storm. Might be better to consult WPNI first, with your NI tagging offer of course.Ardfern (talk) 18:22, 28 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Folks - I was tagging the "UK constituencies" series and was avoiding putting the "Ireland" tag on NI constituencies and was told I should not be excluding NI. (Obviously some NI constituencies existed before and after the creation of NI). But isn't, say, Talk:Belfast (GA;Top) part of the IrelandProj? Should it be? (Sarah777 (talk) 23:25, 28 December 2007 (UTC))
 * Absolutely, Belfast was in Ireland the last time I checked. Remember that this is the WikiProject Ireland not WikiProject Republic of Ireland! Ok. ww2censor (talk) 04:46, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
 * I think that the important point here is that no wikiproject "owns" any articles or categories; all these tags do is to indicate to readers and editors that the items fall within a particular project's area of interest. Personally, I think that the more projects keeping an eye on a particular article, the better. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) —Preceding comment was added at 11:13, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Whew!! I've been through the list and deleted about 20 categories. If I have been to aggressive please revert. BTW, what was Category:Arnold Schwarzenegger doing in there beside his Kennedy wife being an Irish-American? How far do we stretch the copper penny! Here are some that I have a problem deleting outright but maybe someone else will look at them as there may be an occasional article that comes within the project but not the category imho.
 * Category:Protected Wrecks of the UK
 * Category:Pictish art
 * Category:People of the Fenian Raids
 * Category:Monarchs of Jorvik
 * Category:Know Nothing
 * Category:Iona
 * Category:Holy wells
 * Beside that, the Ireland WikiProject does encompass Northern Ireland too but it may possibly a good idea to consult with the WPNI about tagging some specific categories, though I don't see any problem there. If the category is in NI, then it will surely be in Ireland too. ww2censor (talk) 20:26, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks v much for that, w2c, that was v good work. As you'll have seen through the list, some really strange connections can be made the use of transnational categories, and I'm v glad that someone else went through it all to spot some of the strays.
 * I have been through your your list of dubious categories, and have removed them all. In some cases a few articles needed a WP:IE tag, but I don't think that in any of those cases this project can really claim more than a minor interest in the category.
 * On that basis, I'm going to start the bot rolling. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 22:19, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Looking through the list was a bit of a chore but worth it. Some occasional articles from the removed categories might need a Project tag but not the whole category. Curiously in going through the list I noticed several categories that contained only one or two entries possibly because the category is too confining. What is the thought on suggesting deletion of some of those underpopulated categories? Thanks for the work BHG. What's next? Cheers ww2censor (talk) 04:46, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Maybe you could list any too-small categories at WT:IE, and we could discuss what to do with them? Some of the very small ones my have a place as part of a series, but let's take a look at them. I'm happy to do CfD nominations on any that should go.
 * BHGbot's next WP:IE job should be, I think, to start tagging articles, and the first two things I had in mind was to:
 * auto-tag all the articles in Category:Ireland stubs and its sub-categories as class=stub
 * auto-tag all the articles in Category:Ireland-related lists and its sub-categories as class=list
 * obviously skipping any articles already tagged. How does that sound?
 * Thereafter, the bot can start tagging other articles with no parameters set, which will dump them all in the unassessed categories. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 10:01, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

BHGbot stub tagging
Next proposed task:Job0007: Tagging with  all articles in Category:Ireland stubs and its subcategories, except those which are already tagged with WikiProject Ireland or its aliases Irelandproj and WPIRELAND. This job assumes that all articles with a stub tag are indeed of stub class. This may not be the case, but if so, the class can be upgraded on assessment.

Comments please, either here or at User talk:BHGbot/Job0007. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:13, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
 * The only comment has been one at User talk:BHGbot/Job0007 from Sarah, saying go ahead, so I'll roll the bot tonight unless there are any objections before then. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 18:08, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Did you forgot about me!! ww2censor (talk) 23:43, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
 * No, I didn't forget, I just assumed that you was busy or that you were letting silence=assent. Anyway, good to see your approval. It's you and Sarah who most closely keep an eye on these things, so if it's OK with you two I reckon it's OK to roll … which won't now be until the bot has finished its Job0004, a job hat's taking longer than I thought it would, so it may not be until tomorrow. That's probably no harm, because it'll need to run for a while, and my flaky cable connection is due to be repaired tomorrow, which hopefully will make it stop dropping out so often (fingers crossed). --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 00:57, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Don't forget Ardfern - the quiet guy who does mountainous work! (Sarah777 (talk) 02:58, 31 December 2007 (UTC))
 * I didn't forget him ... he's great but he doesn't often comment here, so I wasn't waiting on his input. But it'll be good to have his comments if he has time. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 05:29, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Stub-tagging underway
BHGbot/Job0007 (automated assessment of articles categorised as stubs) is now underway. There are over 7,000 articles in its job list, so I suspect that it will take a day or two to complete (To reduce server load, BHGbot is allowed to save edits only once every 10 seconds, and I may turn it off in the evening, when the servers are busiest).

The articles are being tagged with the  parameter, which places them in Category:Automatically assessed Ireland articles, and displays a note on the talk page warning that the article has been automatically assessed. Editors may be familiar with this technique, because it is already used by WikiProject Biography (from where I copied the template code to handle the  parameter) … but if not, it should all be explained by the stubclass message which is displayed when the   parameter is set.

Hope this is OK. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 12:00, 31 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Of the first 1,000 articles processed, 649 were auto-tagged as stubs, and 351 were skipped because they already had a WikiProject Ireland tag on them. If the same pattern continues, we can expect this process to auto-assess about 4,000 articles as stub-class. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 13:29, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Looks good to me so far. So 10,000 assessed Irish articles seems in sight! That is a long way from 1,044 at the end of July. Thanks for the hard work. ww2censor (talk) 15:00, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

BHGbot/Job0007 is now complete. The final tally was 5,160 articles tagged as stubs, and 2,286 skipped because they already had a WikiProject Ireland tag. That means over 5,000 articles in Category:Automatically assessed Ireland articles, and a similar number in Category:Unknown-importance Ireland articles (it won't be quite the full 5,160, because I have been manually completing the assessments on some of them as they popped up on my watchlist). It's going to take a long time to finish assessing that lot :(

I have few ideas for other jobs BHGbot could do to help with assesment, and will post more later today. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:32, 1 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Good job BHG. The next stats should be generated tomorrow or Thursday, unless it goes on vacation, so we will the end results in table form. Cheers and have a great New Year everyone. ww2censor (talk) 15:48, 1 January 2008 (UTC)
 * The stats page is going to be huge, isn't it? --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 19:31, 1 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Well done indeed. Afraid missed most of December with family matters but will have a look at the >5k article list for potential groups to tackle.  Best to all for a new year of work... SeoR (talk) 20:08, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

CfR for project maintenance category
See Categories for discussion/Log/2008 January 8. The proposed renaming is probably a good idea, but a pity that the nominator didn't notify this project. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 11:53, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

A must-have script
Have just spotted a discusion at the village pump of a brilliant script User:Outriggr/metadata.js: it displays an article's current assessment on the article itself, just under the title. Where you would normally see the text "From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia", this script will change that to "A Stub-class article from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia" or "A B-class article from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia" etc.

It's brilliant if you are assessing articles &mdash; saves having to flip over to the talk page.

To add it, edit your monobook.js and add

&mdash;BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 02:47, 14 January 2008 (UTC)


 * That really does help, thanks for the tip. SeoR (talk) 22:42, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Wow! You mean you figured out how to use it? I am impressed -:) Sarah777 (talk) 23:31, 14 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Yes, figured it out, and actually deployed a later version, which I liked better. But it did take some fumbling around, the approach was new to me. Now, it is very handy - when outside life allows me time to work ahead. SeoR (talk) 07:23, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

No bot for 9 days
I see that the has not generated new statistics for this project for over 9 days. I wonder if it is just busy with other things, or is there is some problem that has dissuaded it from updating WikiProject Ireland's logs and statistics.

I'm curious, because I have manually assessed dozens of articles (possibly hundreds), since the last bot run, and I'm curious to see what effect it has had on the stats. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 22:55, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
 * According to the bot author Oleg Alexandrov it has had some problems and is running behind though from what I read I expected to see out latest result by today—maybe later this evening. Check out the recent posts and replies on his talk page and also at WT:1.0/I. Cheers ww2censor (talk) 23:45, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
 * I have run the bot manually and it only took about 20 minutes which is much less than I thought. However it does not seem to have updated either the quality log or quality pages but the stats are here. Cheers ww2censor (talk) 00:24, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

James II of England
Recently I was trying to reconcile the number of Irish FAs in the statistics and the list of Irish FAs and saw that an Ireland WikiProject assessment template is in the James II of England article. For that reason it appears in the Category:FA-Class Ireland articles but it was never added to the Template:Irish Featured Articles. I wonder if this is just an oversight, or a pro-Irish/anti-British POV? He was still King of Ireland, so I think we should add it in. Do we agree to add the article, or can anyone justify removing the template from the article talk page? TIA ww2censor (talk) 17:00, 31 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Sorry I missed this, oddly, before. I think he has to go on the template.  What he did has no relevance to the facts.  And one more FA on the template does no harm either, they're rather thin on the ground (and even then, I am all too aware, down to support by a few dedicated souls). SeoR (talk) 14:05, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Importance=NA now has a different effect
I have just modified the banner template WikiProject Ireland in this edit to alter the effect of the "NA" value of the importance parameter, as in

This minor tweak removes "importance=NA" articles from the importance categories, which will have a big impact on the statistics (which is why I did it!).

The NA value is used in other templates (e.g. WPBiography) to indicate that the importance (or priority) scale is "not applicable" to this article, and the article is them omitted from the importance or priority categories.

Unfortunately, the WikiProject Ireland template was not doing that. The "NA" value made the template display "This article has been rated as NA-importance on the priority scale", but it also placed the article in Category:Unknown-importance Ireland articles. That was wrong: the NA value indicates that an assessment has been made that importance scale is not applicable to this article, whereas "Unknown-importance" shoukd be for articles whose importance has not been assessed (such as the squillions of article auto-tagged as  by BHGbot.

The result of the change is that after the next bot run, the statistics will show a lot of pages having been removed from Category:Unknown-importance Ireland articles. I think that this will be more accurate, but I wanted to explain why this had happened before anyone saw the next statistics and wondered what was going on.

I hope this makes sense, and that it's all OK with other editors. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 16:47, 16 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Thanks. Sounds good to me - I assume NA is intended to take all  Cat, DAB, List, etc.  articles out of the count?  With Unassessed now empty, that just leaves the few thousand actual  Unknown Importance... :-)  SeoR (talk) 14:07, 23 February 2008 (UTC)


 * And indeed the figures do look better. Cleared the last Unassessed the other day and now tucking into "Unknown Importance" when have the chance - Y, Q, Gaelic characters, etc., cleared. Even with many hands though, will take a while. SeoR (talk) 22:02, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
 * And now 19 letters, and c. 4200 items, to go. Still, a lot better than 5100. Whatever about near-mythical kings, the Eurovision songs have been a surprise, and as for the hundreds of footballers... The BHG-recommended script does help! SeoR (talk) 15:43, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I have been attacking Category:Unknown-importance Ireland articles from the other end of the alphabet. The As are all done, and I'm most of the way through the Bs ... but like SeoR, I was surprised to encounter the Eurovision songs (but unsurprised to recall how dire most of them were), and am staggered by the number of footballers, some of whose articles are merely sub-stubs. I haven't been doing much about non-notables, although I have PRODded a few, but I suspect that a review of the footballers may be in order.
 * As to the Kings, I have been adopting a simple formula: High Kings get mid-importance, others low importance unless they have some particular claim to significance (which I haven't seen so far).
 * Anyway, we're now down to 3700. Should we put something on the project's main page asking for more volunteers to work through this lot? The thing is, that when this 3700 are done, there are another 5000+ articles which aren't tagged at all, and which I can set BHGbot loose on. I haven't done so to date partly because my Windoze PC is ill, but also because I thought it might be a bit overwhelming to dump them all into the task list now. -- Brown HairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 11:54, 12 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Aha, so that's where the A's went. For reasons of morale (do, indeed, please hold back on the other 5k for now), I have been working-off the "smaller" letters, making nice inroads on "E" lately (finishing that today).  It is a lot, and what I am doing is taking a moment over coffee, or when waiting for something big to download.
 * I think some more volunteers might be no harm, if anyone's got the energy. It is a good exercise, and I have had good revelations, as well as those feelings of "no, surely not another footballer (or cricketer - yes!, or hurler...)."  With regard to those, I admire the effort that went to putting them all up, and I am strongly of the inclusionist persuasion - but perhaps a way can be found to more efficiently handle this topic, as it probably is not practical to keep 000's of articles on individual sports people.  Ditto for Eurovision, where surely a single article with tables could do the trick (for all of Irish entries, or one per year for all Eurovision).  But I think that this, along with things like sorting out how many "Top", "High", etc., Ireland should have, can wait.
 * Sounds like a good approach on the kings, I will consider Mid for all High Kings after the mid-800's. Most of what is in this sorting pool is so unquestionably Stub/Low, and with that neat little script, a couple of clicks and bingo... SeoR (talk) 13:55, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
 * (and well done on Guinness, a shock indeed - but good to see sales have been recovering in the battle against imported / locally reformulated coloured water, aka N American "beer").SeoR (talk) 14:02, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

I'm in shock
... having just discovered that this article had not been assessed. Heresy, heresy! Dammit, I can't have been the only kid whose parents recovered from the new arrival with the help of a hospital-supplied ration of the black stuff (in my case, mostly my father, cos my mum didn't really enjoy her ration). As any fule knoe, a person can fulkfill all their daily nutritional requirements by drinking a glass of orange juice, two glasses of milk, and 47 pints of Guinness, and generations of Dubs did just that.

Anyway, I have just assessed it, rating it as B-class and high-importance. (Maybe it should be top importance?)

It turns out to be a former good-article, and it would be great if someone had the sources and energy to improve it to at least good-article status. -- Brown HairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 11:41, 12 March 2008 (UTC)